CREDIT INFORMATION

Written by Katherine Kennicott Davis

MEANING

N/A

NOTES

Dolores O’ Riordan sang “Little Drummer Boy” with Irish band Westlife at the 9th “Concerto di Natale in Vaticano” on December 15, 2001.

Originally the song should have been performed by the band Westlife but they asked Dolores to sing it with them. In an interview given to the “Evening Herald” on July 30th 2004, Nicky Byrne, a member of the band, explained why: “The single biggest plus for me was being invited over to the Vatican to perform in person for the Pope, even though the experience didn’t go quite as planned.We had to perform two songs, live on TV as part of the deal, one of which had to be a carol. We chose Little Drummer Boy, but unfortunately they pitched it in a key that was too high. We tried to do it in rehearsal and couldn’t pull it off. The music director didn’t speak English and we had an hour before we were due to perform live for the Pope in a packed arena of 10,000 for a show going out live on TV.Fortunately the day was saved when we managed to recruit the lead singer with the Cranberries, who were also there to perform, to help us out.”

Dolores was included on “Little Drummer Boy” at the last minute: “Westlife will be forever thankful to Dolores O’Riordan of the Cranberries. The popular group was invited to perform for the Pope at the Vatican last Saturday. Westlife were to perform two songs, “World of our own” and “Little Drummer Boy”. But in rehearsals, the boys found out that the orchestra were playing the song on a different key and the guys couldn’t sing to it. It was too late to change it, but luckily Dolores was around and she could sing the song, so she did it!” (Taken from Dutch TV channel TMF)

“Little Drummer Boy” is a popular Christmas song written by Katherine Kennicott Davis in 1941.